I would like to acknowledge this day with both smiles and tears because our struggle for women's rights has been a long game of snakes and ladders. We see courage among individual women who have tried not to give up and keep moving forward against all odds. That probably is one thing we can be very proud of.
The sad part is that the society that we wanted to change has become more rigid, more conservative, and more humiliating for women than it was ever before. Women have been marched naked in the streets of our country, gang raped and murdered in the name of honour or righteousness but regular citizens wish not to be bothered. Are these signs of a dead society or we have moved to medieval times where people have decided that woman's place is very low in any case so why get ourselves into trouble by protesting these inhuman acts?
When the decision of International Women's Day was taken in 1910 in Copenhagen, the purpose was to acknowledge women's movements and struggles for their rights. I wonder what I should celebrate today. Movements and struggles are made up of common people. But I wonder if the common people are pained by what is happening to the women of this country. Do people only scream when their own body hurts? Do they not feel the pain of the bruising of collective spirit of a society?
I have been working on issues of sexual harassment at the work place intensely for many years. Many women approach me with their individual problems and ask me in frustration why such a common and painful problem is not dealt with in our society as a whole. I always say, it is because each woman wants to resolve her own problem, but does not want to work collectively to solve the larger problem.
So, even those who have been burnt in this fire fail to put in the time and effort needed to resolve this problem once and for all. I think this failure to take collective action is why such problems persist.
I invite all women and men concerned about the future of our society to join the movement. I invite them to join not only to try to look for solutions for their own problems but help each other to attack the social roots of the larger problem collectively. However, as our economy has improved, our movements and struggles on women's issues have really dwindled.
People usually expect social organizations to be available to help resolve their personal problems, but most do not turn around and help the collective struggle to deal with the larger issues. The recent spate of violence directed against active women, including rape of Union Councilors and the murder of Zile Huma has produced no outpouring of anger from our society. This has greatly depressed me. Tomorrow I am opening PTV's live transmission for International Women's Day. I will try to gather my strength and be more cheerful. We cannot afford to loose hope.
Fouzia Saeed is a member of Mehegarh, a Global Fund grantee in Pakistan.
The sad part is that the society that we wanted to change has become more rigid, more conservative, and more humiliating for women than it was ever before. Women have been marched naked in the streets of our country, gang raped and murdered in the name of honour or righteousness but regular citizens wish not to be bothered. Are these signs of a dead society or we have moved to medieval times where people have decided that woman's place is very low in any case so why get ourselves into trouble by protesting these inhuman acts?
When the decision of International Women's Day was taken in 1910 in Copenhagen, the purpose was to acknowledge women's movements and struggles for their rights. I wonder what I should celebrate today. Movements and struggles are made up of common people. But I wonder if the common people are pained by what is happening to the women of this country. Do people only scream when their own body hurts? Do they not feel the pain of the bruising of collective spirit of a society?
I have been working on issues of sexual harassment at the work place intensely for many years. Many women approach me with their individual problems and ask me in frustration why such a common and painful problem is not dealt with in our society as a whole. I always say, it is because each woman wants to resolve her own problem, but does not want to work collectively to solve the larger problem.
So, even those who have been burnt in this fire fail to put in the time and effort needed to resolve this problem once and for all. I think this failure to take collective action is why such problems persist.
I invite all women and men concerned about the future of our society to join the movement. I invite them to join not only to try to look for solutions for their own problems but help each other to attack the social roots of the larger problem collectively. However, as our economy has improved, our movements and struggles on women's issues have really dwindled.
People usually expect social organizations to be available to help resolve their personal problems, but most do not turn around and help the collective struggle to deal with the larger issues. The recent spate of violence directed against active women, including rape of Union Councilors and the murder of Zile Huma has produced no outpouring of anger from our society. This has greatly depressed me. Tomorrow I am opening PTV's live transmission for International Women's Day. I will try to gather my strength and be more cheerful. We cannot afford to loose hope.
Fouzia Saeed is a member of Mehegarh, a Global Fund grantee in Pakistan.
